Harriet Miers was chosen by Democrats

While the expected groups and individuals are already complaining about the selection of Harriet Miers, liberals have no one to blame but themselves.

By their insistance that a Republican president nominate essentially a Democrat justice, they forced Bush to choose two people with little (Roberts) or no (Miers) paper trail.

Liberal senators will complain (and already are complaining) that they don’t know enough about Miers to confirm her, that she must answer specific questions concerning their pet issues – mainly abortion.

The selection of people with very small records (and possibly underqualified) is the direct result of Democrats all but promising that this nomination would be filibustered before it was even announced who the candidate would be.

Everyone knew the playbook and knew exactly how it was going to play out. Any judge that had made a significant amount of rulings would be chastised for every case that didn’t line up with liberal philosophy. Either the nominee would take the Roberts/Ginsburg approach and not answer questions that would hint at which way they would decide in the future, in which case the Democrats would pronounce that they didn’t have enough information to make an educated decision so they would have to oppose the nominee and possibly filibuster in order to get more information; or Bush’s choice would be out front with their conservative viewpoint, in which case the Democrats would declare the nominee out of the mainsream and would filibuster to prevent Bush from “shifting the Supreme Court drastically to the right.”

The Democrats, by following the whims of left-wing intrest groups, insure more of the same from future nominations. Why would a president nominate someone that will guarentee a filibuster by appointing someone with a known record, when they can appoint someone with a unknown (to most) record that has a significantly higher chance of avoid a mud-slinging political battle?

I don’t know if this will help either party in the long-run, but I do know that the country will be worse off.

Many well qualified, possible Supreme Court judges will never get the chance to serve on the nation’s highest bench because they have ruled in conservative fashion during their years as a judge.

Before you say that both parties do it, can I remind you of Ruth Bader Ginsburg? She was nominated by President Clinton to replace a very conservative Byron York, who was one of the dissenting votes on Roe v. Wade.

Were their calls from Democrats to “avoid a ideological shift on the courth” and to appoint someone similar? No, of course not, and President Clinton appointed someone who had an extensively liberal track record and a long-time advocate for abortion rights.

Ginsburg took the approach to not answer any question that could possibly be inferred as giving an opinion on a case that may reach her at the Supreme Court. Most of her testimony was basically “no comment.” The Judicial Committee approved her and the full Senate voted overwhelmingly (Yea vote totals in the 90’s) to appoint her to the Supreme Court.

The Republicans at the time took the approach that although they disagreed with Ginsburg on a host of issues and she didn’t answer all their questions, she was well-qualified as a judge and it was the president’s choice to nominate Supreme Court judges.

Because of the currrent political climate, brought on by the liberal intrest groups, those days may be long gone. Republicans may turn the tables on the Democrats next time and refuse to confirm a well-qualified liberal judge for ideological reasons.

It may now be essentially a given that all nominees must be virtually unknown with no prior rulings that stand-out. While we may avoid future political fights, we may also eliminate many of the most qualified judges before the process even begins.

Thank you liberal advocacy groups and thank you liberal democrats for following in lock-step. You may not be happy with the fruit of your labor.

1 Response

Nice post. However, I make the following observations:1. It is the President's constitutional right to appoint these judges, with mere advice and consent from Congress. Bush is not upsetting the balance of powers by appointing conservative judges – as part of the balance of powers, he has the right to appoint whomever he pleases – that's one of his powers. When we elected him, we chose a conservative court at the same time. When we elected a majority of conservatives to congress, we did the same. Liberals are not interested in the balance of power, just the maintenance of their own power, which is waning due to their increasingly far-left, "out of the mainstream" preaching.2. This is mostly about Roe v. Wade RVW is bad legislation, and it is going to fail. It is even more bound to fail due to the all or nothing approach of pro-choice advocates. Conservatives are also all or nothing when it comes to abortion, and this will end up shooting them in the foot. Sure, we can't make a compromise when life or liberty is involved, but there is sufficient ambiguity around when life starts. Hence my C-RAL suggestion.3. This is also about liberal abuse of the judiciary We need more conservative judges who will interpret law based on its intent, rather than on their own intent. Part of this abuse stems from their subjective view of truth and principle – they believe that laws need re-interpretation based on the mores of the time. Conservatives believe that the original documents represent timeless principles that should not be abandoned based on the changing whims of culture. However, since many of today's situations did not exist then, these founding principles do need application and further expansion – but this is not the same as the liberal approach, which often abandons original intent rather than expanding upon it.4. It will be interesting to see where moderates end up. Both parties are getting more and more polarized. I betcha we'll see more and more moderate splinter groups in both parties – like the "gang of 14" that defied their parties earlier. The John McCains of this world are going to fall into power quickly if everyone keeps pulling to the edges.